IN Tourist Traps

Following our week in Missouri this summer, our family of 5 ventured out for another week of vacation, now that Daddy was done with his classes. Our destination was Louisville, KY, since none of our family had ever toured that area before. Along our drive, we stopped by two fun tourist traps in Indiana. First stop...

Lincoln's Boyhood Home

This site in southern Indiana preserves the farm site where Lincoln lived from 1816-1830.

The site was in a forested area with great walking trails, so it was a nice get-out-of-the-car stop. Along the trail, we saw Lincoln's mother's (Nancy Hanks Lincoln) gravesite and this cabin site memorial (pictured below). These are remains of logs and a stone hearth from what is believed to be the Lincoln family's third cabin.

The rest of the area is known as a Living Historical Farm. None of the buildings are original, but the site was built to imitate a typical farm in Lincoln's time. Several rangers dressed in time period clothing were on the site. They encouraged our children to go into all the buildings and try out all the tools. One guy even said, "This is not a museum. Touch everything!" Our kids didn't need to be told twice! ;) They loved exploring and quickly learned that these tools were HEAVY!

Jaden and Cody filled out a Jr Ranger booklet along the way and earned their 3rd badge of the trip.

Santa Claus, Indiana

When I saw the name of this town just off our travel route, I figured it would have some fun touristy shops. This town was less than 15 minutes from Lincoln City, so the two stops were perfect to do together. It was a cute town, indeed! Santa statues were everywhere. We first stopped at a few little shops and let the kids each pick out their own Christmas ornament.

We even happened to see Santa himself walk through the shop! Adley was too scared to stand next to Santa for the picture. :)

Next, we visited the small, but free Santa Claus museum. Our favorite part was reading letters to Santa from children across a few decades. It was so funny to see what kids requested 15-20 years ago compared to recently and even seeing differences in handwriting as well! The coolest part was learning that for many years, a contingent of residents from Santa Claus, Indiana, would serve as "elves" that would write back to many of these children.

The Santa Claus museum and village area also boasted many holiday artifacts and memorabilia,

... a 22-ft tall Santa statue, dedicated to "the children of the world,"

 

...and the original 1880 Santa Claus Church.

Santa Claus Village was also home to a post office where the kids enjoyed taking pictures...

...and writing their own letter to Santa. The boys each composed their own note and dropped it in the Santa Claus mailbox. They will supposedly receive a personalized reply (from a Santa Claus citizen) in December. We'll see! 

In his letter, Jaden told Santa, "The presents are nice, but could you change your name to Santa Christ instead of Santa Claus? It would be more Christian-like!" 

Our final stop in this little town was Santa's Candy Castle. Boy, did this place have some candy! Check out this entire wall dedicated to Pez dispensers!! Each of the kids used some of their trip money, gifted to them from Grammy and Papa, to purchase some yummy treats. Narrowing down their choices wasn't easy!

Mommy even enjoyed one of the store's signature treats, an absolutely delicious "frozen hot chocolate." No one else wanted to join me, so I was happy to finish the sweet drink all by myself! :)

What a fun combination of stops on this travel day!